


Soon Spreads the Dismal Shade

by jesterlady



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Confrontations, Episode Related, Episode Tag, Episode: s05e01 Night, Gen, Intervention, Missing Scene, One Shot, Season/Series 05, The Void
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-29
Updated: 2013-12-29
Packaged: 2018-01-06 14:04:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1107732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jesterlady/pseuds/jesterlady
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He would defend her decisions to the crew till his last breath, but he was done placating her to her face.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Soon Spreads the Dismal Shade

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own ST Voyager. Some lines are from the show. The title is by William Blake.

Chakotay sucked in a breath as he prepared to face his Captain. His daily reports used to be one of the highlights of his day, now they just meant another encounter with something else alien in this Quadrant.

Kathryn had changed. Whatever is was, he didn’t really know, but she’d sequestered herself in her quarters and hadn’t left for any reason that he knew of. She refused to see anyone but him and didn’t pay any attention to him when he was there.

“Report,” she said in that thin voice she’d been using lately.

She stood silhouetted against the lights shining darkly overhead. She had her quarters set for the lowest illumination possible like she was attempting to draw the darkness in around her, focusing on it, pulling the void around her.

He told her about what Seven had found.

“It's probably nothing. Just background theta radiation. But it could mean there's someone nearby.”

“Distance?” she asked dully. 

“Approximately twenty five light years,” he said.

“It's a long shot, but alter course.”

“Yes, ma'am,” he said.

“If that's all, Commander,” she said.

He stiffened himself up because he’d been planning this for a few days and had lost his nerve every time, but she’d given him the perfect opportunity, and, to be frank, he was getting sick of this…whatever it was.

“Actually, I'd like to make a request. I've been saving up my holodeck rations and I've got three full hours coming. Any chance I might persuade you to join me for a few rounds of Velocity? It'll help clear your mind.” 

“My mind is perfectly clear,” she said in a determined tone of voice and he inwardly groaned because he knew that voice perfectly well.

“And what if I told you I'm not leaving until you join me?” he said, gearing himself up for the fight.

Could he get her to get angry and throw him in the brig? That would make her face some part of the crew, if only Tuvoc. 

“I'd say, have a seat, it'll be a while,” she said instead, gesturing to a chair behind her.

“Then I'll be blunt,” he said. “You've picked a bad time to isolate yourself from the crew. This ship needs a Captain, especially now.”

She finally faced him and he didn’t like how vacant her eyes were.

“Would you be satisfied with I'm just catching up on some reading?” she offered. When he just kept looking steadily at her she twisted her face and started speaking again. “I'm not sure I understand it myself. It started when we entered this, what does the crew call it?”

“The Void.” 

“Charming,” she said, then stretched her arms out. “Oh, what I wouldn't give for a few Borg cubes about now. Anything for a little distraction. Strange as it sounds, I almost long for the days when we were under constant attack. No time to stop and think about how we got stranded in the Delta quadrant. How did we end up here, Chakotay?” He didn’t say anything and she spoke again. “Answer me.”

If she was going to play that game then he’d give her the answer he firmly believed in.

“We were faced with a difficult choice. We had the means to get home but using it would've put an innocent people at risk, so we decided to stay.”

“No, no, no,” she said, waving her arm. “I decided to stay. I made that choice for everyone.”

“That’s what a Captain does,” he said quietly. “We're alive and well, and we've gathered enough data about this quadrant to keep Starfleet scientists busy for decades. Our mission's been a success.”

“The very same words I've been telling myself for the past four years,” she said. “But then we hit this void and I started to realize how empty those words sound.”

“Kathryn,” he said helplessly. 

“I made an error in judgment, Chakotay. It was short-sighted and it was selfish, and now all of us are paying for my mistake. So if you don't mind, Commander, I'll pass on that little game and I'll leave shipboard morale in your capable hands. If the crew asks for me tell them the Captain sends her regards.”

“Not good enough,” he said tightly.

“Excuse me?”

“You’re the Captain, not me. Are you trying to put me in command, because I’m sure there are more direct ways to go about it. Are you just going to sit in here and sulk and feel sorry for yourself? Feeling guilty about the people who you stranded here and then when they need you, refuse to even see them?”

“You’re out of line, Commander,” she said. 

“Am I? I’m doing my job, but I don’t see you doing yours. Who’s out of line?”

“You’re trying to make me angry,” she said, dullness returning to her tone.

“Damn right I am,” he said. “But at the moment I could care less if that makes you remember your duty to this crew and this ship. To Neelix who’s panicked and downright terrified seventy five percent of the time, or to Harry who looks up hopefully every time the bridge doors open and then sighs when he sees it’s not you. Right now I’m disappointed in you; I’m upset that my closest friend who I have always looked up to can’t bring herself to be the Captain she has always been.”

“I’m sorry to disappoint,” she said, “but I’ve made up my mind. If you have a problem with it, put it in your log.”

“Oh, I will,” he said. “But it’s so very convenient right now that any repercussions from that log won’t be happening for another fifty odd light years.”

“Something good had to happen from what I did,” she said with a self-deprecating smile.

He couldn’t believe what he was hearing from her. He was seriously starting to wonder if this void had abnormally affected her in some way and if there was something the Doctor could do, because the person in front of him was not Kathryn Janeway.

“Nice hypocritical statement,” he said.

“Captain’s privilege,” she said darkly.

“Oh, so you’re the Captain now. That’s fine, so are you just planning on staying in here for two years? Never showing your face? And then what? When we get out of here are you just going to show up on the bridge and expect everyone to follow your orders? Will you magically be better from your self-induced guilt? Are you planning any of this?”

“What’s to plan, we’re in the Void,” she said.

“Okay then,” he said, “well, I guess you probably don’t really want to see me either so I’ll just make my reports via the computer from now on. I’ll spend my time more profitably, namely caring for your crew, and don’t you dare expect anything else than for them to feel more like my crew by the time we get out of this void if you keep this act up.”

He turned on his heel and left, barely registering her hurt face and a low speaking of his name because he was seething so badly.

He would defend her decisions to the crew till his last breath, but he was done placating her to her face.

He didn’t know if he would put it in the same terms as she had, but he was almost relieved when the red alert happened right before the ship plunged into darkness. 

He started to make his way to the bridge and picked up a hyperventilating Neelix along the way. They were attacked and saved…by the Captain.

He stowed his feelings on that subject for another time and they continued on their way.

They encountered two alien species and figured out that one was poisoning the other. There was the possibility of a wormhole that would get them out of the void but at a cost.

The Captain stepped up. She was herself again, fiercely ignoring any tension between the two of them. He did the same, but he still went to Tuvoc and tried to get some sense out of what was happening and what her state of mind would be. Luckily, Tuvoc was thinking along the same lines.

In the end she tried to sacrifice herself and he went along with it to her face and then met with the senior officers to ensure it would not happen. If she wanted him to be the fine first officer she’d called him, then he was going to act like it.

“You told them,” she said quietly to him.

“I wouldn’t be a fine first officer if I hadn’t,” he replied, smiling.

It was almost like normal with them but there was an underlying current that carried through their fight with the Malon and destruction of the wormhole. They made it to the other side and then Tom spotted a star.

There were stars everywhere, a quadrant of life expanding around them everywhere they looked. It was the most beautiful thing Chakotay had ever seen.

Afterwards he reported to the Captain’s ready room for a debriefing on their situation.

“I thought you were going to make your reports via the computer from now on, Commander,” she said briskly.

He winced.

“I apologize for that, Captain, it was…out of line.”

“No,” she said, looking up and her face was soft. “No, you know better that that. Perhaps you spoke out of anger at the end, but you were right.”

“That doesn’t mean I should have said what I did,” he said. “I’m sorry, Kathryn.”

“I’m sorry, Chakotay,” she said. “It was selfish of me to expect you to carry my weight, to burden you again when everything was and still is my fault.”

“You made the decision,” he said, “but I don’t think there’s anyone on this ship that wouldn’t agree with it now.”

“Even B’Elanna?” she said wryly.

“I think she’s pretty happy at the moment,” he said. “Besides, it’s not the decision anymore; it’s the one who made it. You’ve proved yourself to these people, Starfleet and Maquis alike, and I’d hate for you to lose that.”

“I’d hate to lose it myself,” she said. “I promise I’ll try not to cloister myself away whenever the guilt crops up.”

“How about you just talk to me instead? Or, I hear, a good game of Velocity really clears the mind.”

“Is that so?” she said. “Well, a talk from you can sometimes chafe the conscience so maybe it would be easier to just beat you into the ground?”

He raised an eyebrow.

“A solid theory, but let’s see if you can prove it.”

“1600 hours,” she said. “Holodeck two.”

“You’re on,” he said, smiling, and turned to leave.

“Chakotay,” she said. He turned. “Thank you.”

“It’s my pleasure,” he said. “I’m glad to have you back.”

He returned to his seat on the bridge and smiled to see Harry back at his station, jovially arguing with Neelix over the com. Tom was at the con, his fingers tapping almost gleefully over the panel, while B’Elanna stood over his shoulder pointing out errors in Tom’s course, and he playfully argued back. Tuvoc alone remained unchanged at his station but Chakotay almost thought he could see a lessening of tension in Tuvoc’s shoulders. Either way, Chakotay would take it. Their crew’s morale had brightened and the Captain was herself again. The Void was officially behind them.


End file.
